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In the league, we're going very well, currently 4th after 17 games (5 points behind the leaders), and a reasonable goal difference. However, the teams does tend to press the self destruct button in the easy game.

In the FA Cup, Bedfont Town were despatched in Q2, with Farnborough beaten in Q3. However, Oxford City turned us over in Q4. That annoyed me even more when I saw the draw for the 1st round. it was Waltham Forest (who?) v Oxford City, with the winners of the replay getting Kidderminster in the 2nd round. Missed out on a good cup run, and more importantly, quite a bit of prize money

The FAT has been kind to us, as we have been drawn at home to Frome in Q3, so hopefully a nice easy passage into the first round (unless the team presses that big red button again).

Avramski- Why did you go on holiday if you were 4th? I'd also like to add that holidaying is allowed, but i'd prefer it if people didnt do it as it isnt really in the spirit of the challenge. I apologise for not making this clear earlier and dont blame you for doing it, I get really excited about my intake to

Just like to thank everyone for the congratulations I'm a bit worried about next season and if we will survive or not! Time will tell! Doing the end of season update, but i've been busy last night and this morning, might be this afternoon before I get it up.

I'm back. I've started two other saves now as well. So I plan on rotating between them as and when I feel like. Pre-season will take me ages, but hopefully I can get some decent funds and kick on the improvement.

In the league, we're going very well, currently 4th after 17 games (5 points behind the leaders), and a reasonable goal difference. However, the teams does tend to press the self destruct button in the easy game.

In the FA Cup, Bedfont Town were despatched in Q2, with Farnborough beaten in Q3. However, Oxford City turned us over in Q4. That annoyed me even more when I saw the draw for the 1st round. it was Waltham Forest (who?) v Oxford City, with the winners of the replay getting Kidderminster in the 2nd round. Missed out on a good cup run, and more importantly, quite a bit of prize money

The FAT has been kind to us, as we have been drawn at home to Frome in Q3, so hopefully a nice easy passage into the first round (unless the team presses that big red button again).

I'm back. I've started two other saves now as well. So I plan on rotating between them as and when I feel like. Pre-season will take me ages, but hopefully I can get some decent funds and kick on the improvement.

The reason I ask is because i've spoken to someone about this already and they part that made me curious was because he only watches the text during a match on full speed, meaning a match only takes like a minute or something.

I basically play all my games and watch the actual match itself. This way I can make tactical changes which you wouldn't be able to do just watching text. You can see who's playing good and who isn't. I know you might think "well the match ratings tell you what you need to know..." but i disagree. My striker could be getting loads of chances and building up a match rating, but he might be missing them all, so i'd probably replace him, but you wouldn't know that unless you watched the match.

I also do my own training schedules and keep an eye on player progress etc...

[Edit] I also think playing it the way I do brings more success in results.

I play commentary only, on full speed! this is because it would take me forever to complete a season otherwise. I keep an eye on player progress and only change the training if i have a young player with loads of potential. I always do individual focuses though.

I go through phases TM. If I'm enjoying the game I like to watch as much of the game as possible and I'll agree that it does give better results imo. However, If I can't be bothered or want to rush through it'll be text only, full whack and it takes me about 5 minutes to complete the match.

I doubt having parent clubs will help the youth you produce as your recruitment will be to low to get foriegn players coming through. Personally I wouldnt bother having one as they arent really worth it for 10k a year. they are allowed but i wouldnt bother getting one as you are not allowed to use players they loan to you.

A long and difficult season, with the usual up's and down's! I must say, probably my favourite season in a save since I started playing in 2007. In the past i've been used to winning and I do consider myself pretty good at the game (trying not to be big headed), but this is where all the fun starts and will test how good I actually am.

The reason I enjoyed this save so much so far, is because i've not been winning every game, i've not got far in the cup competitions, as strange as that sounds! I actually like losing, because it shows that i've got a challenge in front of me and the fact that I managed promotion throught the play-offs, I feel i've achieved something Anyway, on to the important stuff!

Chester...

It was a real challenge for me, as we were predicted 8th and the board would surely not tolerate anything lower! I was impressed with the fact that Chester were a Professional club and the stage was set for a long and hopefully successfull season! Here are a few screenshots...

A fantastic season which saw us takes first place at one point, 5 points clear and then drop down into 5th due to a massive slump in form! I thought it was all over at one point, but Gary Beckford YP01 came in and steadied the ship! I also believe part of the reason we managed to bring the winning ways back was due to sending several players at a time on holiday, to regain their fitness back. Here are a few screenshots...

This was probably a waste of time, because we were never going to get far. We drew Southport in the draw and I thought, yeah we might be able to get a result...

(H) Chester 2 - 2 Southport - They scored in the 89th minute to salvage the draw, which really annoyed me.
(A) Replay: Southport 2 - 0 Chester - They totally outplayed us and we probably should have had a much heavier defeat.

That was the end of the cup on the first hurdle!

FA Trophy...

I had high hopes in this cup and thought we may be able to get far, especially with seeing our league form, which was very good at that point...

That was the end of our run in the cup and disappointing after beating our rivals from the BSP, then being beaten by a team halfway down our own table!

Verdict: A fantastic season, but wish we could have done better in the FA Cup, it just wasn't to be! Next season will definately be all about survival and I'm fairly confident of a decent finish after our match against Darlington and since Beckford came to the club. We just need another striker to step up and partner him!

Great season TM cant wait to hear how you get on next season. nice to see you back Nottingham Forest and great that the 2 of ye decided to do this file on the career forums where i will be following for sure.

as for my hendon the 3rd season is going much better than the rest of them and just beat a club records of the most games without a loss 6

I lost 5 on the bounce that dropped me well down the table, so I decided to let my assistant sort out the mess. He's managed to get the team stabalised in 11th, but we're 14 points of 5th with 9 games to go.

TM, I'll post a screeny of my youth intake in my end of season report. Sufficed to say though, I'm pretty happy with the potential there, plus there is not 1, not 2, but 3 players with gold star(s) against their name for CA

Great season TM cant wait to hear how you get on next season. nice to see you back Nottingham Forest and great that the 2 of ye decided to do this file on the career forums where i will be following for sure.

as for my hendon the 3rd season is going much better than the rest of them and just beat a club records of the most games without a loss 6

Thanks mate, glad to hear your doing much better Keep it up!

Some more news from my end as I was offered a new contract, which I negotiated for a 5 year long deal! Glad to put pen to paper on a long term deal

I doubt having parent clubs will help the youth you produce as your recruitment will be to low to get foriegn players coming through. Personally I wouldnt bother having one as they arent really worth it for 10k a year. they are allowed but i wouldnt bother getting one as you are not allowed to use players they loan to you.

I was more interested when my scouting was worldwide for a Brazilian link and maybe produce Brazilian youth!

sounds like you guys want to complete 2 challenges at once! this one and the big club, small country one. Yes, I'm surprised how successful it has been to. definately going to be back doing it for fm 13 as well!

TM - Congrats, great season. The play-off final must have gotten tense with a goal in 97th minute!

Not going so well for me, still struggling with the team around the middle of the league. No threat of going down but no excitement of going up. But, and this is a big but, I have just had a youth intake which could potentially result in at least play-off places next year.

Youth Intake: Very pleased with it. There were two good players and I couldn't pick between them for who deserved the tag so I gave both of them one. Jamie Humphrey is exactly what I needed. I was lacking a goalkeeper and having him come in may mean that I will not leak as many goals as I have been. Ross Hale YP03, I am very happy with this fella. He is able to play all over the middle of the park and, hopefully, he should be able to supply my striker with some more oppurtunities.

I upgraded my junior coaching a couple of months before this which I think helped a lot.

TWFL- YOU GOT A 5 STAR CA YOUTH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! check his report and see what league your staff think he has the potential to play in. If it doesnt say then change the staff member until one has an opinion. that has to be the best Youth Intake so far!

Squad : Will be loosing steven last our best DC and also we will loose our best LB due to not wanting to renew. a few other fringe players on wages will be let go. 9 youth players are in the squad but not all start every game.

Finances : Still really bad, organised a tonne of friendlies to try and produce some income that helped for a few months. the cup run gave us a good 100k but still managed to loose it all. strange thing is the biggest expenditure is the wages at 10k per month, problem is my gate receipts are awful

I was going to do this but I read the rules and saw that your manager profile has to be realistic!

Well to be fair, nobody could say I'm not Sammarinese, how would you know Secondly, I can't see how being Sammarinese is going to influence anything and thirdly, if Ri decides i've broken the rules, then fair enough, so it's down to him I guess.

TM - Congrats, great season. The play-off final must have gotten tense with a goal in 97th minute!

Not going so well for me, still struggling with the team around the middle of the league. No threat of going down but no excitement of going up. But, and this is a big but, I have just had a youth intake which could potentially result in at least play-off places next year.

Youth Intake: Very pleased with it. There were two good players and I couldn't pick between them for who deserved the tag so I gave both of them one. Jamie Humphrey is exactly what I needed. I was lacking a goalkeeper and having him come in may mean that I will not leak as many goals as I have been. Ross Hale YP03, I am very happy with this fella. He is able to play all over the middle of the park and, hopefully, he should be able to supply my striker with some more oppurtunities.

I upgraded my junior coaching a couple of months before this which I think helped a lot.

That is a pretty epic youth intake! But it happens, i've bought someone as Man Utd before from Crawley who were down in the BSP at the time and he was judged as a future leading premiership star.

TWFL- YOU GOT A 5 STAR CA YOUTH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! check his report and see what league your staff think he has the potential to play in. If it doesnt say then change the staff member until one has an opinion. that has to be the best Youth Intake so far!

I would give Kavanagh a tag as well

He's great. By my Ass Man, with 12 jpa and 13 jpp, he's predicted to be League 2 standard. But more exciting is Anthony Freeman YP02, the best from last year, is very highly rated right now and I'm extremely worried that I'm going to lose him.

I'm not sure about Kavanagh yet. I'm going to treat him as a YP see if he improves enough over the year to deserve the sacred tag.

That's what I think is going to happen with Anthony Freeman. I can just tell he's going to be great but how great and for who is the worrying part.

The problem we are going to face is, eventually a team bigger than us is going to come calling and there wont be anything we can do about it, except let them leave. But! This does mean money! We may need to sell in order to improve our clubs, improve the facilities etc... So it's not all bad

Pre-season has been a success so far and i'm happy with a few of the results! First off i'll start with my new staff members, introducing my new Assistant Manager, Coach and Physio...

Assistant Manager - Kevin Cooper... This guy was hard to find, i'd looked through all the list nearly for a suitable person for the job, but they all either wanted too much wages or weren't the right person. His attacking stat means we are going to get good training in that area Coach - Ivan Guerra... Not too bad stats and much better than my other coach and the one that left, should do a good job and is very strict which helps.Physio - Duncan Russell... This guy was initially a Fitness Coach, but I managed to get him to become a Physio and he definately is much better than the one i let go. At first he demanded high wages, but I got him down to a £425 demand. I could only offer £375 and I pushed him to the limit, to a point where he was mad, so I said take it or leave it! Thankfully and to my suprise he accepted!

Next up, the Pre-Season matches. I decided to go with a mix of difficult and financially motivated matches and some easy-ish and easy matches...

The issue we have is, for people like me and TM, we have probably one of the better sides. Not that that is a bad thing because it's not. However those who are having to build and build. Well it could them great. The reason being is, if they can get a 2/3/4 youngsters who are ready for first team football from off, then they can build a side or look at selling them for a profit.

I'll be able to play from tomorrow and will hit my youth intake either tonight or in the morning so an update will be on. Really looking forward to it and fingers crossed I'll get some decent lads to back up my very thin squad. We're currently down to 2 substitutions in every match day squad! Luckily the only position that is completely out of players is my defensive minded midfield and deep lying playmaker, in which I decided to play one of my centre backs and my most creative midfielder in replacement respectively.

This is definitely one of my most enjoyable saves on this FM, I can't get enough of it. Got some sort of affinity with a fair few of my players already, in particular my rock at the back David Ray and my long range goal specialist Francis Quarm

Greyman- well done on another solid season and some exciting youth prospects. How are you getting through the seasons so quickly?!

thanks ri916, as for progressing quickly im off college since thursday so plenty of time and as i play with just commentary, and off course you dont spend your time buying players. i think according to my status i have played around 30hrs of this file already so around 10hrs for a season i think is reasonable thanks for making this challenge lol.

And a little update we have some good news over in hendon as we begin our 4th season. Click HERE for good news

on the right we see the team, the starting 11 saw 6 of my very own youth players start. 4 of the 5 on the bench were also my own youth products seeing 3 come on for sub appearances. really looking forward to see this team grow as a whole.

Not too bad, but could still do better, is how I would evaluate it. While we finished higher up the league with more points than the previous season, I'm still concerned about the teams ability to hit the self destruct button when in a good position. This wasn't helped by having a run of 4 games where I had a player sent off.

Anyway, March 13th rolled round, and with an increase in my junior coaching being agreed earlier in the season, I was excited to see just how good the youth intake would be. I wasn't disappointed!

Financially wise, I'm currently sitting on £34,500 in the bank having made a profit of £151k during the season, so I'm in a reasonable position. A couple of friendly tournaments in the preseason should see me set for the year so hopefully, I can get another increase in my junior coaching.

Hehe. I'll be concentrating his training on a few areas to try and cut down that risk. I'll also be making him my reserve team keeper for a couple of seasons, as I feel he will benefit more from that instead of collecting splinters.

Originally Posted by ri916

good season avramski! Nice players in the youth intake as well, which may give you a shout at the playoffs next season.

Hope so! As long as the team avoids hitting the self destruct button too often.

So nobody will be making their way into the first team squad, but it's handy to actually have some back up now. I'm quite surprised and confused as to why I got a Turkish player, which is quite strange.

I've lost now. But when I posted that I wa still waiting for the run. I was just slightly disappointed of all the teams I could have got, I got one I didn't want. Not giving anymore away as I haven't posted in my thread yet.

Football Manager is one of the few games out there that you can play for years without getting fed up, there are so many different ways to approach it, in my opinion it is one of the best games out there, particularly in terms of value for money.

Football Manager is one of the few games out there that you can play for years without getting fed up, there are so many different ways to approach it, in my opinion it is one of the best games out there, particularly in terms of value for money.

5000% agree with this I have got bord of every game i've ever played, except Manager games! Football Manager has just taken it to that next level!

That's it, our playoff spot secure, although Dartford have already sealed their place as the new Champions. It's a pity really, as compared to the points tally of last year, we are bang on target to getting more than the 72 points that won the league as we have 69 points from 39 games.

That's it, our playoff spot secure, although Dartford have already sealed their place as the new Champions. It's a pity really, as compared to the points tally of last year, we are bang on target to getting more than the 72 points that won the league as we have 69 points from 39 games.

Great news! Well done on that achievement and hopefully you can go on for promotion!

Great news! Well done on that achievement and hopefully you can go on for promotion!

Fingers crossed! Although, I'm looking at it as a win-win kind of opportunity. The main reason for this is that with us being a small club, I believe are players are nowhere near the quality required to match the teams playing in the BSP, we occasionally even get a right thumping in this league. However, promotion would nonetheless still be a massive achievement and I would be ecstatic with it, hopefully meaning our club would grow as a whole and the experience would be magnificent for all my players, even if we were to come straight back down.

In what proved to be a surprising performance from relegation candidates Carshalton, the top of the table was extremely close between Carshalton, Chelmsford and Dartford until the last 10 games or so, where both Carshalton and Chelmsford's wheels fell off their title challenge and they had to succumb for a play-off spot.

The play-off's saw us drawn against Salisbury in the first round. We initially lost the first leg 2-1 only to come back in the second leg at home with a 2-0 victory, goals coming from Billy Crook and a Paul Vines thunderbolt to end his 14 hour goal drought.

The final drew us with our rivals for the season, Chelmsford.

We took the lead early in the first half through top scorer Dean McDonald only for an equaliser to come soon after. However, a corner in the second half spilled out to Kieran Murphy on the edge of the area, who unleashed a venomous volley into the top corner to clinch promotion for the Robins.

The key to this successful season has to lie with our tough to beat style of play, in the first half of the season in particular we had an impeccable defence. The attackers struggled somewhat though, and if it wasn't for McDonald's short and sharp bursts of goals, we would have been a lot lower in the table.

Fantastic Season Joe!!! Congratulations on promotion and it seems well deserved! Looks like you've got a good team there, with your form towards the end of the season probably being down to fitness. Sounds like the final was a tense one

Fantastic Season Joe!!! Congratulations on promotion and it seems well deserved! Looks like you've got a good team there, with your form towards the end of the season probably being down to fitness. Sounds like the final was a tense one

Yeah, I'd say fitness was probably a big issue. Although, less of an issue than I first thought when starting this challenge.

The final wasn't that tense really, Chelmsford weren't very threatening and it seemed inevitable that we would be victorious. However, it is often these sorts of games that turn out so badly on FM!

If anyone would like to see any other screens of statistics or players, feel free to ask.

Really disappointed about our losses for the year. My wage budget is the fourth lowest in the whole of the BSS yet we are making incredible losses!

We are also having to have some seats fitted as a league requirement for the step up which hasn't helped at all. So increasing our junior coaching is not looking possible until our finances sort theirselves out.

Late on in the 82nd minute too, even more pleasing! I will warn you, the BSP is extremely difficult!

Thanks! I'm looking forward to the challenge but I'm expecting absolutely nothing like last season. This is where it is going to start to show that we cannot make transfers as I wouldn't even describe my players as top class for the BSS!

Thanks! I'm looking forward to the challenge but I'm expecting absolutely nothing like last season. This is where it is going to start to show that we cannot make transfers as I wouldn't even describe my players as top class for the BSS!

That is why I believe that this is the toughest challenge on FM. People may disagree and say that going to a country such as San Marino or Ireland and other countries that are small, but you must not forget, in those countries it is easy to reach the top in their leagues and get into the Champions League, which allows the money to flow in for investment in facilities etc... In our case, we have to reach the Premiership before we can even think about stabilizing our finances! This means we will probably have to fight for 40+ seasons before we even get close...

Season 3 update. After 9 games, it's disasterous! Just 1 win and 2 draws see us 21st and more importantly, 4 points away from safety.

My strikers have seemingly forgotten how to shoot, and my defence, erm ....

Anyway, looking closer at report cards for my team, my coaches reckon that anyone with 3 1/2 gold stars for CA is a decent BSS player, while 4 stars is a good BSS player. With only 8 players rated at 3 1/2 stars or better, no wonder i'm struggling a bit (2 of them are keepers as well).

Anyway, I've just changed formation to make us a lot more solid down the middle, hopefully quantity instead of quality will work.

For the full update, have a look here. That will direct you to my thread which includes images for a more clear understanding

I've reached November 1st so far and we are in 12 place! It's been difficult at times, but we've pulled some results together to take us to the mid table position.

In September we suffered a major defeat at the hands of Luton, an 8 - 0 loss!!! We were struggling with Morale and it was already low, but this brought things to an all-time low. I wasn't impressed with certain players before-hand, which I let them know, but after this defeat I fined 5 players, which included the person who got a red card. This set off a massive dispute in the dressing room with 2 players refusing to accept I was right to fine them their 2 weeks wages. I stood firm, because I want respect from my players and people who want to be at the club, no matter how tough things get, they refused to accept, so I told them they were transfer listed as of now! They immediately said "I've said what I need to say, but I don't want to leave the club".

In October, one of the transfer listed players came back with a complaint to the media about being transfered. I went ahead and removed the other player from the transfer list as I felt he had learnt his lesson, whilst leaving this certain player to rot on the transfer list and explained he needed to show me some respect. He replied with similar words to "Sorry"!

We are currently struggling financially for some reason, but in August, managed to secure better Junior Coaching, bringing that to an Average state.

Season 2013/14 - Carshalton Athletic
All in all a mediocre season. I stayed mid to lower table throughout with the only thing of note being the cup run to the 2nd Round where I had a shot of potentially going up against a PL team but I lost to Histon meaning I was out. FA Trophy was appalling, got knocked out at our first attempt.

Finances: Looking much more healthy after several friendly league competitions. This meant I was once again able to upgrade the Junior Coaching facilities so they are average (they are towards the top end of average as it's been average the last 2 upgrades).

Squad: This is the team that guided me to safety. I now have some of the youngsters making themselves known and next season I should hopefully be able to push on up the table with them. Special mention to Anthony Freeman YP02 who acheived Top Goalscorer in the league with 24 goals. I play him as a lone striker so he gets a lot of chances and tends to put the majority away.

Is that Ashley Williams by any chance TM? If so, one word, clown. That's me being nice as well . He's thrown a hissy fit already. Nick Wood's come back strongly since he had a mardy and requested a transfer though. That's one of the great things though, if someone throws a paddy. Just sell them.

Is that Ashley Williams by any chance TM? If so, one word, clown. That's me being nice as well . He's thrown a hissy fit already. Nick Wood's come back strongly since he had a mardy and requested a transfer though. That's one of the great things though, if someone throws a paddy. Just sell them.

Cos I'm the BOSS! .

How did you guess Absolute idiot, nobody is bigger than the manager or the club! I've had enough of disrispect from a few players and i'm making an example of Ashley big time.

Transfers - I didnt make those transfers as you can see i took over on the 29th May

League Table - i knew i wasnt going to get promoted but i just wanted to consolidate my position in the league looking forward to next season see if i can get into to midtabel and also see what youngsters i get

TWFL- A good season there and it is clear Freeman is developing well. Playoffs next season

Toon- well done on staying up first year! could we see your youth intake please?

looks like i might have to start loading up the coffers with money spinning friendlies. Only had one junior coaching upgrade and keep having training facilities cancelled. I also have a new stadium being built but i wasnt told about it?

TWFL- A good season there and it is clear Freeman is developing well. Playoffs next season

Toon- well done on staying up first year! could we see your youth intake please?

looks like i might have to start loading up the coffers with money spinning friendlies. Only had one junior coaching upgrade and keep having training facilities cancelled. I also have a new stadium being built but i wasnt told about it?